EU Trade and Co-operation Agreement: Fishing Industry
Debate between Lord Gardiner of Kimble and Lord Kerr of Kinlochard(3 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord Gardiner of Kimble (Con) [V]
My Lords, on the specialised committee on fisheries, those matters are being worked through and there will be an update on that in due course. What I would I say to the noble Lord is that we have been working with industry and also, particularly, with Dutch, French and Irish officials to resolves issues with documentation, which is the key point. On the issue of the trade agreement, I disagree with him. With a 25% uplift in quota, what we want to do is to work with industry, and that is why we have said there is this £100 million fund programme to modernise fleets and the fish processing industry, precisely because we think there is a great future for UK fishing.
Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB) [V]
It seemed very odd at the time, but maybe it is just as well that the Prime Minister chose to focus on fish not finance. The City survives, while the fishing industry is on its knees. I really would not advise the laid-back Mr Rees-Mogg to repeat his uncaring quips on the pierhead at Peterhead. In my day, the UK team in Brussels Fisheries Councils always included an expert Scottish Minister. The autumn negotiations might not have ended in such a disaster if that precedent had been followed. Why was it not followed?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble (Con) [V]
My Lords, my experience, having been at Fisheries Councils where I have been with the Scottish Fishing Minister—and, indeed, the Welsh and Northern Irish—is the close collaboration that we have with all part of the United Kingdom as we, in this case, work towards a more successful future for fishing. All I can say is that my experience is precisely that: that there is a very close dialogue across the United Kingdom.
Sustainable Fisheries for Future Generations
Debate between Lord Gardiner of Kimble and Lord Kerr of Kinlochard(6 years, 4 months ago)
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Lord Gardiner of Kimble
My Lords, any access to EU bodies will be subject to negotiation, but, as I said, collaboration and co-operation will be extremely important. On the other issue raised by my noble friend, I am looking for a definition. My understanding is definitely that we will now be responsible for up to 200 nautical miles or whatever the median line is with another country. I am very happy to put a copy of the map in the Library so that your Lordships can see how this will work for the UK and other countries, so there will be a clear understanding of the waters for which we, under international law, would be responsible.
Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)
My Lords, for our Scottish waters I warmly welcome the stress on sustainability in fish stocks, but I am uneasy about the sustainability of the devolution settlement, fisheries not being a reserved subject. Can the Minister reassure us that the White Paper has been discussed in draft with the devolved Administrations?
EU: Energy Infrastructure (EUC Report)
Debate between Lord Gardiner of Kimble and Lord Kerr of Kinlochard
Lord Kerr of Kinlochard
The noble Lord is a great expert on such things. I will only say that I agree that it is a mirage. If we were to do it not as part of a global agreement, we would damage ourselves very seriously. If we believe in free trade, open borders and low tariffs, we need to be very careful of well intentioned exceptions.
My fourth point is that I am uneasy—I am getting into deep theological territory—about the call in paragraph 126 of the report for binding EU-level 2030 targets on energy consumption. What growth assumptions would underpin that target? If a member state of the European Union managed, by the skill of its economic policies and the energy of its population, to achieve an astonishingly high growth rate and therefore higher energy use, what would we do about the binding target? Would it mean that the state would have to be fined? If so, we would need to amend the treaty to give ourselves the power to do that. Let us not go there. Again, the Government’s response seems to be wisely silent on this recommendation.
Lastly—and here I am probably taking a step too far and pushing my luck too hard—I am not sure that I buy even paragraph 103, which has a marvellous ex cathedra ring to it when it states:
“Member States must be under no illusion: failure to agree a 2030 framework will restrict investment”.
I am in favour of a 2030 emissions target, but I am not 100% convinced that whether there is one will have much effect on the quantum of investment. Such targets undoubtedly have an indirect effect on the energy mix in member states. The mechanism is peer pressure from colleagues in the Council.
In fact, energy mix decisions probably owe more to what national electorates want or are prepared to wear, but there is no doubt that targets have some effect on energy mix. However, I doubt whether they affect the quantum of investment because companies do not base investment decisions on such targets. They are moved to invest or not invest by the clarity, consistency and credibility over time of the policy regimes in force in member states, and by whether profits will be permitted. Companies like profits. If they are going to invest, they want some kind of assurance about profits.
What deters investment is uncertainty, not targetry. What deters investment in this country is in part the hypocrisy of doubling the social and environmental costs paid by the energy consumer through his utility bills—the carbon taxes, installation costs, smart-metering costs and other energy-efficiency costs that have doubled in the past 12 months—while at the same time supporting and encouraging populist criticism of the industry for putting up prices. Of course it will put up prices if it has to charge all the levies in its bills. I find it objectionable to make the consumer rather than the taxpayer foot the bill for environmental policy. That seems to me to be socially regressive. But if you do not allow profit, you will not get investment. For the investor, long-term targets are neither here nor there. That may sound cynical but it is true.
I will turn to where the noble Lord, Lord Giddens, took us and talk about gas. The report sees it as a transition fuel and the committee worries that investment in gas could be at the expense of investment in renewables. I prefer to go with Energy Commissioner Oettinger who argues:
“Without gas, renewables have no chance”.
I do not mean just the intermittency problem. The fact is that when the EU economy takes off again, if emissions are to stay down, we need to replace coal with gas. That would cut emissions by 50%, which is the biggest single thing that we could do.
Poland today is 90% dependent on coal burn for its electricity generation. No wonder Poland leads the way in shale gas, with more than 130 concessions already granted. Coal-burn generation is increasing across the EU and in this country. Seaborne Appalachian coal is back on the market here, driven out of the US power market by shale gas. The speed of the shale gas revolution is striking. I think that the committee may have slightly underestimated its scale and effects. I am not talking principally about indigenous UK reserves or even EU reserves, although that story is quite dramatic.
At paragraph 74, the report quotes the British Geological Survey estimate of UK reserves of 150 billion cubic metres. However, last month the British Geological Survey raised its estimate from 150 billion to 37 trillion cubic metres, which is more than 500 times our current annual gas consumption. I do not expect us to exploit the Bowland shale nearly as quickly or efficiently as the Americans are exploiting Eagle Ford and the Bakken, or as quickly as the Chinese are already starting to, and will, exploit theirs.
I am talking about—as was, I think, the noble Lord, Lord Giddens—the effect on global markets and the new ability to access tight gas, coal-bed methane and shale gas. In the US, gas prices for industrial users fell between 2005 and the end of last year by 66% in real terms. In Europe, there was a 35% increase. That is because the US has shale and we do not yet. US emissions went sharply down. It is a delightful irony that just as the US Administration were angrily rejecting the Kyoto targets, the USA’s emissions were peaking. The US has easily met the targets that it rejected—because it has got shale. Therefore, it is burning less coal.
The US will export. I predict that the US chemical industries’ efforts to prevent exports will not succeed. The LNG price at European ports will therefore fall. Already, the Nigerian, Angolan and Qatari LNG intended for the United States is coming here because our price is three times the US price, or heading for Japan, Korea and China, where it is six times the US price. Clearly, these disparities will not last. World prices will fall.
Already, the Nigerians and the Dutch have had to give up pipeline gas prices linked to the oil price. The Russians are being forced to follow.
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
My Lords, I apologise to the noble Lord and I am very conscious that he has had to deal with some interventions. But we are getting to a point where he is receiving the amount of time that is for openers and winders. The Companion refers to 15 minutes for other speakers and 20 minutes for openers and winders. I apologise to him but I thought that it was only courteous to the rest of the Committee.
Lord Kerr of Kinlochard
I apologise to the noble Lord. I did not see on the Order Paper any reference to a time limit.
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
That is precisely why I have referred to the Companion for those timings for those debates that are not subject to a time limit.
Lord Kerr of Kinlochard
Very good. I have a paragraph to go. May I complete my speech? I bow to the opinion of the Committee.
The Economic Implications for the United Kingdom of Scottish Independence
Debate between Lord Gardiner of Kimble and Lord Kerr of Kinlochard(11 years, 4 months ago)
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Lord Kerr of Kinlochard
Had I managed to ask the noble Lord before he sat down, I would have asked—